James Creswell sings the role of Oroveso in a new production of Bellini’s Norma and he puts down his main props – an axe and a leather apron - to speak about preparing for this new part, in an opera that is quite a grand departure from his familiar roles.

Coming up at the Howard Assembly Room later this week is an event that celebrates the work of legendary composer Nino Rota. The last event in the Howard Assembly Room’s FILMusic season sees accordian player Richard Galliano and saxophonist and clarinet player John Sur...

Beauty and Clarity. These are the two pillars we are trying to bridge in making this piece, commissioned by Opera North Projects to accompany the Howard Assembly Room’s upcoming visual arts installation, which this year is Katie Mitchell’s ’Five Truths.&rs...

This new production of Bellini’s Norma – Opera North’s first in over twenty years – continues our exploration of the bel canto repertoire which has also embraced Donizetti’s Maria Stuarda and Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi in recent years. Norma includes one of the mo...

“Imagine that we are sitting in an ordinary room. Suddenly we are told that there is a corpse behind the door. In an instant, the room we are sitting in is completely altered; everything in it has taken on another look; the light, the atmosphere have changed, though t...

She is ‘the wickedest woman in history; she is a pattern of female virtue. She is a public benefactor, builder of aqueducts and lighthouses; she is a selfish tyrant who tortures slaves for her entertainment. She is as playful as a child; she is as old as sin. She is C...

The western established a new idea of modernity, setting a technologically advanced society against the blank slate of a nation in its infancy. The Hollywood dream machine manufactured heroic tales of its founding fathers only a few generations into the past, but always roo...